The farmers around us burned the gorse that autumn, perfect for girls who had decided to be witches. We scarred our faces black with broken charcoaled stumps.
We found a jag-toothed oil drum for our cauldron. We wrote careful spells with much underlining in old maths jotters.
You found a dead crow with one wing, and we threw it in with leaves and rosehip seedpods, stirring and chanting like we thought witches should.
You said to take our boots off, so we danced barefoot and screamed our spells at startled rabbits. Spells to capture dark eyed Ewan in the year above; to make my boobs grow bigger; to give that cow Michelle pustuled acne everywhere.
Afterwards, we smoked stolen cinnamon sticks, watching the dry ends crackle as we coughed. We spat on our palms and swore friendship forever.
When our mums called us for tea, we squeezed further behind the fractured branches, scrabbling in stones and dust, held hands and waited for the moon.
*
The gorse on Calton Hill is dayglow yellow and creeps coconut on our arms as we drag through. Sometimes we can only manage half an hour in our lunch break.
One day last summer, a huge fire had stripped the bushes, curling thick golden flames like lava over the rock, painting new shadows on the smooth monument pillars. It had taken hours to make it safe. But we were too old to play in the sooty remains, too tired to chant and dance.
We sit on a bench and look out to sea, and you say you wonder where the spells are now? Where are the ones to heal the pain and stop the torment, and find the lost?
I hold your hand and know you don't want any words.
*
But today you are smiling and say let's go to The Meadows, and we walk through grass, kicking dandelion heads, see them float like leftover breath. We have prosecco in paper cups. You take off your shoes to stretch out your toes and tell me he is home. Your boy has come back, he is free of his father, and there is new life after all.
We sit on a rug and hug quietly, with joyful tears. We laugh to remember the spells, and you point at my now sagging chest.
And we don’t want to leave. We hold hands and wait for the moon.